A Quiet Drink
by blackberet
Summary: Farkas and the Dragonborn share a late-night bottle of mead while he tries to figure out why she's wearing an Amulet of Mara. One-shot.


As soon as Farkas hears it, he's wide awake. A noise, out in the corridor of the living quarters. Animal. He can't smell it the way he could've with the wolf blood, but he listens for a few seconds and the barking makes it clear enough what the creature is. And beneath it, the clank of armor.

He grabs his sword and bolts out, unarmored, ready to defend his shield-siblings and the sacred halls of Jorrvaskr with his life. And that's how he and the Harbinger find each other: he prepared to kill and die in his woolen trousers, she desperately shushing a shaggy gray dog that looks about as threatening as Ria. Vilkas is three paces behind them, looking like keeping his eyes open is the fight of his life. They're still wrapped in fur cloaks against the Evening Star wind. Snow is melting off the joints in their boots.

"Shh! Damned dog," Matilda hisses. The dog barks again and wags its tail. Matilda shakes her head and turns to him. "Sorry to startle you, Farkas. We were trying to slip in quietly, but my new friend here isn't exactly a master of stealth."

"Neither are you two," he comments, lowering his sword. Under the cloak, she's still in full plate armor with Wuuthrad strapped to her back. Clanks with every step, even on the carpet lining the center of the hall. Vilkas is a little better, but not much. "Welcome back."

They've been gone more than a week. He's glad to see them back safe. It shouldn't have taken them that long to rough up a couple of guys in Morthal.

"Thank you, brother." Vilkas claps him on the shoulder. "I'm going to lie down before I fall down. Matilda, we'll speak again soon."

"I hope so," she answers.

"Good night, then." Vilkas moves past Farkas into their section of the hallway and his door opens and shuts behind him.

_What was that about_, Farkas wants to ask. But before he can, Matilda says, "Did we miss anything important?"

He shrugs. "Not much. New round of Imperials all over the place, trying to get the Jarl to let them move in to protect the city. How'd the job go?"

"Fine. We cracked all the right skulls. No permanent damage. Coin and honor all around."

"You sound tired."

"Just cold and road-weary. I could use a drink."

"What do you want?" He jerks his head in the direction of the bar in his room.

She laughs. "I wasn't soliciting. I can scrounge up something from the larder."

"It's fine. I'm up now."

Matilda hesitates another couple of seconds and gives in. "Mead?"

"Black-Briar."

"Yes, please."

"Done." Farkas retreats into his room to put his sword down and light some candles, pulls on the woolen undershirt he left on top of his armor last night and gets to work. Out in the hall, he can hear the dog bark and its master order, "Quiet! Meeko, go into my room." Her door creaks as it opens and closes behind the animal, which is still barking happily as it trots off. From the sound of it, it might be the only creature in Skyrim without a healthy fear of the Dragonborn, which for Farkas's money makes it a fool.

He's pouring the mead into a tankard when she appears in his doorway. She's ditched the furs and her helmet and gauntlets. Left the rest of her armor on. Her fair hair gleams like a septim in the half-light. If someone asked you to picture a heroine of legend, Farkas thinks, you'd come pretty close to her, except for the yellowing bruise on her cheek from the job. "Where'd you find the dog?" he asks.

"Hjaalmarch. He lost his master, whose ears doubtless still ring with barking in Sovngarde. Not a bad fighter, though."

"You're taking in strays now? Next it'll be orphans." Farkas hands her the tankard.

For the first time since she got in, the Harbinger cracks a smile. "You know me I can never resist a cause." She drinks deep, throwing her head back like she's in a tavern contest. "Mmm, perfect. Thanks."

He figured she'd leave once she got what she came for, but she's still standing around at the threshold like she expects him to ask her in, so he does. It's the first time she's ever been in his room for more than to say, _job came up. Let's go. _She looks around as she steps in, and he watches her eyes fall on the bar, his lute resting in the corner, his bed. Too late Farkas realizes that volume 3 of _The Real Barenziah_ is still sitting out in plain sight, and he prays to whatever god protects idiots that she won't be able to make out the title. Or that she'll think he's just reading up on history.

But she's studying the shield he left leaning against the wall. "I've never seen you use one of these," she comments. She bends down for a closer look. He doesn't have to glance over to know exactly what she's seeing: the intricate metalwork restored, the back reinforced with steel and fresh leather straps that'll go easier on the arm. Hours of work at the Skyforge with Eorlund bellowing at him the whole time until he got it right.

"Found it in Redoran's Retreat a while ago after the bandits cleared out," he explains. "Been working on fixing it up. I thought I might be able to make some good coin on it when it's done."

"It's beautiful, Farkas. You could start a shop with pieces like this, make a killing."

"I might someday. Always thought about it." Not retiring, but the shop. It'd be something to do in between jobs. He's never told anyone that but Vilkas.

Matilda stands up. "A nice idea. Even we Companions need to do something other than fight once in a while." She carefully frees Wuuthrad from her back and takes a seat at the small table by the bar, resting the axe against her chair. Farkas shrugs and pours a second tankard for himself. Tops her off while he's at it and takes the other chair. Wonders if the drink is really what she wanted after all, coming in here. Maybe something's up and she needs to talk. Or maybe she's thinking—as he is now—about the times they've carved through a tombful of draugr and come out still flooded with restless energy, fighting back the beast, and found themselves against a wall. They've never brought it back to Jorrvaskr, but if she asked, he wouldn't say no.

He drinks while he waits for her to make clear what it is. Close to her, and in better light than the torchlit hallway, he can get a better look at her now. And he notices the large, round amulet around her neck for the first time.

"An Amulet of Mara? You're lookin' for marriage, then?" Farkas blurts out before he can think.

It dangles at her throat, scraping and knocking against her breastplate as she moves. If the Harbinger ever wears jewelry, she keeps it under her armor next to the skin, but there's nothing subtle about the way she's wearing this piece tonight. Then again, that amulet isn't designed for subtlety. Like a wolf, the woman has her teeth bared for the hunt—the only question is, who's her prey.

For a wild half-second, Farkas wonders if it's him. Then he realizes he's kidding himself. It's not that he thinks he's a bad catch—and not that he's never had offers. He can swing a sword, cook a meal, sweep a floor, all things he imagines might appeal to a woman. And whatever jokes the others might make, he's not stupid. But he's not eloquent or handsome. Couldn't follow her into a Jarl's hold and rub shoulders with all the silk-wearing courtiers easily like she does. And he's afraid of spiders. No woman who can kill someone with just her voice wants a man who's afraid of spiders.

In the end, he's—ordinary. And the Dragonborn is anything but. When they sing songs about her in ages to come, Farkas isn't stupid enough to think he'll be in them.

She chuckles softly. "I know I've been away from Skyrim for a few years, but last I checked, this was still how we Nords seek a marriage partner."

"Hrm," he replies.

"Hrm what?"

He thought _Hrm _was good enough by itself. If he were better with words like Vilkas, he'd be able to tell her she can't leave. She's only been here a few months, but she's their _Harbinger_,and Jorrvaskr already feels wrong when she's gone. And they've lost enough good people recently. She should be fighting for honor and glory, not washing a stranger's clothes in a cottage in gods-know-where. Farkas drinks, buying himself time. But he can't figure out how to get all that out the way he wants it to sound, so he just answers, "Just didn't think now would be the time."

"Why not?" she asks.

"Why do you _think _not?"

"Dragons? Civil war?"

"Right."

She sets her tankard down and looks at him seriously. "Three weeks ago, you came to me and asked me to help you cleanse your blood. Knowing the power it would cost you—power all of us can ill afford to spare given the dragons and the civil war. Why?"

_Because my brother did it_ is the first thing Farkas thinks to say, as always. But he knows it would be a lie. He'd made his decision long before he'd heard Vilkas's. The day Kodlak died. Sitting on the floor of the main hall, keeping vigil over the old man's body, that was when he knew. "Dragons. Civil war," he admits. "When Sovngarde calls, I want to answer."

She nods. "So do I. Even we have to set our eyes on the horizon sometime."

He watches her drink and thinks about the night they returned to Ysgramor's Tomb. Remembers pulling the second head out of the gore-streaked sack and dropping it into the flame. The clank of metal on stone as he was driven to his knees, feeling like a part of him had been ripped away. He saw double the whole battle: two Harbingers, two pale wolves. But she never faltered. When it was over, she steadied him until he stopped shaking, and then he repeated the ritual for her. Farkas can still picture the she-wolf, see her disintegrating against his blade mid-lunge, and the tears at the corners of Matilda's eyes when she stood again. Clean. They made the long trek back to Jorrvaskr in silence, and when they slept on the road, Farkas dreamed of Sovngarde.

He wasn't sure how to tell her how grateful he was. Maybe he should've tried harder.

"However long I have," Matilda says, "I'd like to spend it with someone."

"Doing what?" he asks unusually sourly. Drinks again. Pours more for them both. "Playing house?"

He can still hear the dog barking from the other room, trying to get her attention. _You and everyone else in Skyrim, hound._

"I couldn't. You don't retire from being Dragonborn." Now it's her turn to drink. They'll drain the bottle in minutes at this rate. "I doubt much would change. I'd still be traveling and fighting. I'd still be Harbinger, if all of you would have me. I'd just have a home of my own to come back to."

He would've thought hearing she'd still be Harbinger would have made him feel calmer, but it doesn't. "And someone sitting there waiting?"

"Of course not. I wouldn't marry someone who wasn't a fighter in their own right. How does the song go again? 'Our hero, our hero claims a warrior's heart?'"

Farkas is no bard, but that sounds like a stretch even to him. "Think that line's supposed to be about _your_ heart."

"My broader point stands. A sense of honor and a good sword arm are minimum qualifications."

_She sounds like she's talking about the Companions_, Farkas thinks, and then—_maybe she is_. He's been picturing a wealthy merchant, Belethor or someone of his ilk; maybe some silver-tongued bard or noble. Maybe that moony-eyed housecarl Balgruuf gave her. Maybe even Ulfric Stormcloak, who has her running all over the country on his errands. Wouldn't that be one for the songs: the Dragonborn and the man who would be High King, winning a free Skyrim together. Shouting their enemies to Sovngarde. But this is the first he's considered it could be one of her own.

If she's occasionally turned to him in the wake of the hunt—well, the Harbinger goes hunting with all of them, almost maddening in her attempts to avoid showing preference to any of her shield-siblings. No reason to think he's the only one she's had. And any of them would marry her. Torvar already talks about it when he's in his cups. The other new blood are in awe of her, even if Njada's sharp tongue would never let her admit it. Aela keeps to herself, but Farkas has seen her watching Matilda when her prey isn't looking. And Vilkas….

Vilkas has never talked about his feelings toward their new Harbinger. But he's clearly come to respect and trust her. When the Circle meets, he turns in her direction for counsel. When blades need sharpening, he carries hers up to Eorlund, not the other way around. And when he wanted to cleanse his beast blood, Vilkas didn't ask his brother to come with him. He asked her, just the way Farkas did. He's good at all the things Farkas isn't.

And now here they are, coming back in the middle of the night days later than expected, and she's wearing an amulet and telling Vilkas she hopes they'll speak again soon—

_Oh._

He finally sees what's going on. Matilda is marrying his brother. He's the obstacle. Vilkas must be convinced he's taken a shine to her, or maybe she thinks a couple of tumbles mean they have some kind of understanding she needs to clear up. She's here to get his blessing before they make it official. Probably meant to be a kindness, Farkas guesses. But she didn't need to do this—all this _build-up_. Why couldn't they just say it in the damned hallway: Farkas, we're getting married. What good does it do you to be good with words if you can't just come out with what you mean?

If it were anyone else, he might just let his dumb mouth flap open and ask, "What about me?" Worth a shot, anyway. The worst she could say is, Farkas, you're drunk, in the morning you'll forget you said such a stupid thing to me. But Vilkas is the one person whose claim he won't oppose.

"Well? Any other objections?" she asks. Farkas realizes he's been staring at his empty tankard. Matilda drains the last of the bottle into it for him. She's running low herself, and he wonders if he should get another bottle. The bar's well stocked. Might even have some Reserve around someplace. If they just keep drinking, Farkas thinks, maybe time'll just stop.

"No. I'm out," he says finally. "I swore I'd lead the song of triumph for you, Shield-Sister. If this is what you want to do, then that's what I'll do." And he lifts his tankard like the warrior her is.

She clashes hers against it, but not the way she does after a battle. On those nights she slams her mug around like she's trying to break your arm, laughing as the drink sloshes onto her gauntlet. Tonight she's gentler about it. Doesn't want to wake Vilkas across the hall, maybe. She says quietly, "Thank you, Farkas. You've always been at my back, since the day I got here. It means a lot to me."

"Yeah," he says. "Me too."

They drain their tankards dry. That should be it, Farkas knows. As good a place to leave it as he's gonna get. If he just keeps his mouth shut, she'll say, "Well, I should be getting to bed. Thanks again for the drink," and she'll pick up her gear and go to her room, and tomorrow or the next day she and Vilkas will make their announcement and he'll raise the first toast. He might train a little harder for a while, but as long as he doesn't say anything to make this worse, in a week, or a month, or a year, he won't even remember that that drink was the heaviest thing he's ever lifted.

But because he's an idiot, he jabs the dagger in his own ribs and says, "It's Vilkas, isn't it?"

Whatever response he expected, the one she gives him isn't it. She stops dead and stares at him the way Farkas imagines she did the first time she saw him transform. "Wha—Vilkas? Why would you think that?"

It's so clear to him. He ticks the evidence off on his fingers, same way he put it together. "The two of you are gone for a week. You come back wearing an Amulet of Mara. And he…sharpens your sword, and….uh…." It still makes sense to him, but it sounded so much better in his head.

"Oh, no. No, no, no." Matilda tries to drink out of her empty tankard and quickly puts it down. "I didn't realize—I see why you might think that, but—" He's never seen her trip over her own tongue like this. A minute ago he'd've cursed anyone who'd said she was even capable of it for a liar. "Mara preserve me. You're right that I wanted to spend time alone with Vilkas, but not for the reason you think."

Now he's even more confused. "Then why?"

"He didn't trust me when I first got here and we've had our differences since. I wanted to make sure we were all right with each other now. And I needed his advice. I do have someone in mind, but it's not him."

Two questions are warring in Farkas's mind and he ends up spitting out both. "Advice on what? Who is it, then?"

"No, I think it's my turn for a minute. You've been asking all the questions in this discussion." She leans forward. The amulet glints as she moves. "Why? Are you interested?"

Farkas still isn't sure what's going on here, but he's tired of dancing around it. "Won't lie," he says finally—_finally_. "I am." He can see her expression change, but he can't quite read it. By the gods, he misses the days when he could smell what people were thinking. "And you?" he asks.

Half a second later, he gets his answer as her lips crash into his.

He can taste the mead on her tongue, hot and sweet, and her hand fists into his hair and then she breaks the contact, all before he can catch his breath.

"I won't lie," she whispers right next to his face, and he'd swear on the Nine that the Harbinger's cheeks are flushed from more than drink. "I am."

_She is_. Farkas can't get his thoughts straight, everything has changed so fast. "Wait. I still don't understand what you wanted from Vilkas, then," he says.

"The two of you are so close. I thought it might be nice to have his blessing to marry you. And I wanted to make sure he thought you'd say yes."

"What'd he say?"

"That he couldn't figure out what I saw in such a mouth-breathing ice brain, but that if I ever did anything to hurt you, I'd have to explain it to his fists. And that you'd probably marry me, if I'd stop drinking milk long enough to do something about it."

Farkas snorts. That sounds like Vilkas, all right. "So the trip…."

"We did go Hjaalmarch for the job. And then he came with me to the Temple of Mara in Riften to get the amulet. We rented horses, but between the snow and the dog, it took longer than I expected."

"Too bad," he says. "Since you're just gonna have to turn around and go right back there."

"And you'll be coming with me?" she asks.

It takes him a minute to try to figure out if that's a serious question. He'd've thought it would be obvious that anyone she asked would jump at the chance to marry her, especially him. But her expression doesn't look like she's joking. "Of course," Farkas says finally. "Not sure why _me_, but I'm not gonna talk you out of it."

"Because I like a man with a good arm and an even better heart. And honor. Who understands when to let his inner beast go, and who will help me defeat mine. Who knows how to fight, but also knows that there's more to life than fighting. Who can restore a shield and play a lute. Who will offer me a drink when I wake him up in the middle of the night instead of punching me in the jaw. Even I'd have punched me in the jaw, Farkas." She reaches for his hand and he gives it to her. What a pair they make, all calluses and scars and busted knuckles. "I want to marry a man who will stand at my side, that the world might never overtake us."

She's changed a word, but he likes this version better. When she puts it all that way, he sounds almost heroic. Like someone who might be a match for a Dovahkiin after all. "You forgot something," he cuts in, before the pressure behind his eyes threatens to overtake him. "I grew up around Tilma. I make a damned good pie."

Matilda laughs, this time so loud and long she doesn't seem to care who she wakes. "And a man who can bake a pie! And has a sense of humor. And is good in the sack." She shoots him a look, lowered eyelids and half a smirk, and his blood starts to boil. "Well, I guess technically it's never been a sack."

"Sack too," he offers.

"Every man's mead-hall boast."

"Unlike the rest of them, I can prove it."

"What an embarrassment of riches. As I limp through the streets, all the townspeople will turn and say, 'There goes the luckiest wife in Skyrim.'"

He starts laughing along with her and their mouths find each other again, longer this time. "It's settled, then. You and me," he says with satisfaction when they pull away. "And the dog."

Matilda cocks her head to listen. "He's finally stopped barking. I didn't even notice. He must have fallen asleep."

"If you went back in there, you'd wake him up," Farkas points out.

"And then he'd wake the whole hall up. Bad idea." She stands up, and there's that look again. "Well, good thing there's still a bed free in the whelps' room."

He sweeps an arm under her legs and hauls her up against him, armor and all. Carries her to the bed and sets her down gently on top of the furs. She looks up at him with an expression that's like the light of home in a storm, and her hair just looks _right _splayed across his pillow. The Amulet of Mara gleams up at him. The war and the dragons are still outside, but for at least one night they're someone else's problems. Finally, they're at a point where he doesn't need words for what he wants to say.

"Remind me," his betrothed murmurs, "to drink with you more often." Farkas just smiles as she pulls him down on top of her.


End file.
